A Week of Solemn Remembrance

This past week was a time for outrage and anger regarding the treatment of our nation’s finest…our Veterans. The Warriors who are always there when we need them; who sacrifice more than any other public servant, and seldom ever discuss their business with those who are not a fellow brother in arms, finally had their case heard by the public. Veterans have earned a place of honor and respect of a sometimes no so grateful public. Ending the week highlighted by the disgraceful performance of the VA, an aging Veteran sent me this video...it deserves to be viewed by all.

We have a shameful government which has allowed the bloated bureaucracy to over shadow the promises made to our warriors, much in part due to their desire for self aggrandizement, personal gain, and the forgotten promises made to the American people who put them in office. By their action, which borders on criminal negligence, they have lost control of not only the Veterans Administration, the BLOB we graciously call bureaucracy, but all government entities which are unfettered terminal cancers supported by the hard working taxpayer.

This week the Veterans Administration was called to task about a long smoldering list of complaints that can aptly be called reckless, fraud, and abuse perpetrated upon the most honorable citizens of our country. Had not such abuses directly led to the deaths of several Veterans who were either denied treatment or were given the two-step shuffle in scheduling an appointment to be seen by a doctor, the public would have never known. And to think the VA managers in charge, many of whom were give bonuses for expediting the patient appointments by cooking the books with complete disregard for the potential to bodily harm to those they have a duty to serve, many will simply get a pass.

President Obama expects the public to believe that he only “learned about the issues at the VA after reading about it from news sources”, when in fact the Regime was thoroughly briefed by the Bush Administration about such problems back in 2008. Documentation and testimony however, reveal Obama was aware of the delay problem as far back as 2005 as noted by World News Daily who wrote…

“On June 28, 2005, for example, Obama complained at a hearing on the VA medical care budget (he was a member of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee ) that somehow it seems that we’re willing to trot in front of flags and take photographs with soldiers, but when it comes to the appropriations process, we’re not there.” The article went on to quote Obama in 2005, “disabled veterans are waiting hundreds of days just to get their claim processed”.

NOTE: WND, formerly WorldNetDaily, can best be explained by its mission statement: “WND is an independent news company dedicated to uncompromising journalism, seeking truth and justice and revitalizing the role of the free press as a guardian of liberty. We remain faithful to the traditional and central role of a free press in a free society – as a light exposing wrongdoing, corruption and abuse of power”.

But that’s not all…The WND article quoted Obama as adding, “With the recent announcement that the VA is facing a shortfall of approximately $1 billion in fiscal year 2005 it seems that our concerns are well founded. Unfortunately, the VA’s current shortfall, and larger shortfalls predicted for future years, has confirmed that your Administration (referring to Bush) has not prudently addressed the budget impacts of these conflicts (Iraq and Afghanistan).”

With this bit of “reminder history”, here we are 9 years later Obama saying he only being became aware of the problem in recent news reports. When will the incessant lies cease? This pattern of deceit is just one in a long series of misleading statements, innuendo, and outright lying to the American public whether it is Benghazi, the IRS targeting opponents of the administration, NSA spying, Fast and Furious gun running, Immigration, the number of Obamacare enrollees, Obamacare-you can keep your insurance, doctor, hospital, and family insurance savings will be $2500 per year, and on and on, and on.

With all this and to make matters even worse, it took Obama three weeks to make a public appearance and statement about the issues regarding the VA. Prior to Obama’s appearance however, in a recent White House briefing, Jay Carney even had the temerity to state “the president had identified problems with the agency as a candidate and pledged to take action to improve the services for veterans”. I believe he failed to convince not only me, but the majority of Americans when he went on to state, "What you have seen since President Obama took office is that he asked for and received from Congress significant increases in the Veterans Affairs budget." What he didn’t say was that $489,000,000 of the increase went to VA conference room furnishings and upgrades.

The media in general should hang their heads in shame as they have refused to investigate and bring to light the President, Cabinet Members, the Legislators, and bureaucrats who are trying to usurp the U.S. Constitution through the Administration’s mantra of “change” which nearly 60% of the voting public rejects wholeheartedly. We are side-tracked by their “exposes” on Girls Gone Wild During Spring Break, General Motors Recalls, Legalization of Marijuana, Chris Christie and Bridgegate, Gay Marriage, Will Hillary run for President, the Kardashians, the elevator battle between Jay Z and Solange (Beonce’s sister), month-long coverage of Flight 370, and other minor/insignificant issues, while Rome is Burning.

The media with few exceptions have covered-up the malfeasance, waste, deceit, and budgetary mis-management of those in the Administration and have ceased being the watch dog for the American public. A glaring example of how the media has become derelict in competent reporting is the President’s claim the economy, while not robust, is headed in the right direction, and that under his astute handling we have seen the addition of 3.5 million jobsdue to the Recovery Act and that overall there have been 8 million new jobs created under his administration. Sounds impressive, but such misleading information has gone unchallenged by most of mainstream media with few exceptions.

8 million jobs would be a growth of 133,000 jobs each month, right (12 month/year)? Unfortunately the Bureau of Labor Statistics tell us it takes about 140,000-180,000 new job creation each month just to keep up with the number of new people entering the job market form immigrants and school graduates. Hey America…We are going BACKWARD!

Getting back to the VA situation, the President says he wants to wait for the Inspector General’s report before taking any significant action; this is after saying how important Veteran care is and that he’s mad as hell! They’ve had five, going on to six years to address this problem and he wants to wait for the IG report. Have you noticed a pattern here with this Administration? It goes like this:

Phase One: Claim they know nothing about the issue at hand and that they only discovered the problem after hearing about it in the media.

Phase Three: The President makes a public appearance and states it is his number one issue and he will get to the bottom of it and see that those in charge face severe consequences.

Phase Four: No real investigation on the Administration’s part occurs, no one is held accountable, and nobody loses a job. At best, those in charge are put on PAID LEAVE (does Lois Learner ring a bell?), moved to a different position, given a promotion and moved, none OR all the above! When Congressional oversight occurs, the Administration puts up roadblocks at every turn, fails to comply with requests for documents, redact documents turned over so they are nearly unreadable, and government employees called to testify before oversight committees plead the Fifth Amendment.

Phase Five: Stand by and wait for the next shoe to drop.

The handling of the Veteran’s Administration fiasco this time around may be different as the government has really “stepped-in it” with the problem effecting some 23 million Veterans and is causing lost of life. They have taken the right, first step in allowing some Veterans to seek care outside the VA System, but the sad part about this, is that the VA has always had the ability to let Veterans seek care outside the system; it’s that we are now just learning this after the alleged loss of more than 20 lives.

For those who are reading my thoughts on the VA issue who may not be a Veteran or have a family member affected by the Veterans Administration, I advise you to hold on to your hats, as this is just the tip of the iceberg and is a harbinger of things to come under Obamacare. Imagine if the Veterans are treated this way, and they are the most deserving of all citizens, what is in store for the average Joe-citizen.

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Ed Mattson is a published author and medical research specialist. He is currently development director of the National Guard Bureau of International Affair-SPP, Fundraising Coordinator for the Warrior2Citizen Project, and Managing Partner of Center-Point Consultants in North Carolina. He can be contacted at emattson0711@yahoo.com